According to publicity material at the time in the modelling press, these figures were re-issued by Douglas Miniatures in the late 1960’s/1970’s and another source states that Douglas issued some new poses. Well, I’ve seen enough over the years to know that all the existing poses can be found in datable Skybirds collections/Skybirds packaging, and there are so many paint variations, particularly of the Civilians, that I can’t tell you what’s a ‘Douglas’ and what isn’t. I suspect the Douglas were issuing inherited ex-Skybirds stock, as I’ve seen trays and trays of both mint painted and unpainted casting go through auctions, and someone, somewhere produced baths-full of these figures, which is not to say they are all as common as mud, some are, some aren’t, but there will be more to find…

I love the guy with his hands in his pockets, waiting for the dawn mist to clear or his ground-crew to sort his ‘string-bag’ out. The paratrooper can be found with the shroud-lines in place, but inevitably there are only little scraps of what looks like tissue paper trapped in the knots at the ends of the lines where a parachute is supposed to be! This is not to say you can’t get one with the parachute, but that’d be mint in pack which is beyond my normal budget in these things!

The searchlight (a civilian one is seen here - and a recent purchase) was the same unit as one soldered to the backs of slush-cast lorries by Benbros (I think? Or Charbens…Morstone?), so were probably bought-in from another sub-assembler. The green sandbags are home-painted, not a colour variant.


The lower poses are half-German specific (two on the right) and a paint variant on the running pilot from the first image in this post; there are also grey versions of the ground-crew in the previous image. The blue figure may be civil airline or naval officer, but looks like a Luftwaffe staff officer to me, so he lives in their bag!


The Airport building was part of a large (and changeable) range of military and civil aerodrome accessories some based on actual buildings from Croydon or Hounslow (early/pre-Heathrow) airports, typical of the products of firms such as Hugar or Horton (see farm post above), early Faller or Hornby ‘O’ gauge tinplate era train-set accessories or the handmade buildings of Timpo or Trix, they might have been bought-in from a larger company that would specialize in finishing such things, leaving Skybirds to concentrate on making their aircraft, sending out aircraft kits and expanding the metal parts and figure ranges, but, they certainly had the equipment and skills to produce all the scenics ‘in-house’, so it’s only my opinion (not even an opinion really, more of an idea?), based on the conjecture that they were quite a small company?
2 comments:
I have a couple of Skybird Quads(tractors)....do you know anything about them.
Hi Annon,
I don't know anything about them I'm afraid, but the vehicles seem to have been a later and not well catalogued addition to the range?
If you want you can send me a picture or two and I'll put them on the blog and see if anyone else can help?
Cheers
Hugh
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